When using social media, like other forms of marketing, small businesses must allocate their scarce resources, namely budget and employees, to ensure they’re attracting a steady flow of new prospects, keeping existing customers satisfied, and driving profitable sales.

Here are the major take-aways for small businesses from Ascend2’s research along with actionable social media tactics.

On social media, engagement by itself isn’t sufficient to drive business ROI. While research shows that engagement is a major social media objective for the majority of businesses, it’s not an end in itself nor does it necessarily translate to sales and/or profits. Includes research and input from seven social media experts. Source: Heidi Cohen’s Actionable Marketing Blog